100 Thing Challenge

Dave Bruno, a 37-year old Californian entrepreneur, is launching into a challenge - he calls it the 100 things challenge. He's working on cutting down what he owns to 100 items total. The fascinating conversation in the comments to his post centers mostly around how he counts the items - per pair, per collection, per category?

When I moved here from Italy, I brought only two suitcases containing clothes and books. Several years ago I finally disposed of the rest of my books I had stored in my family's garage. They were important enough to keep as my biggest love is that of learning, yet they were easy to give away after not holding them for years.

My philosophy has since been that of trading items - whenever I buy something, I give (which I prefer) or throw away something else. One spare closet has to remain empty and so it does. Yes, I park the car inside the garage without contending with piles of unused or older items. Periodically, I bring in books to work knowing that the intention is for them to not come back home again. Instead, I share them with colleagues.

I can see an economic slowdown if more of us adopt an even stricter challenge - that of not buying new stuff for one year. Imagine what wonders that would do for credit card payments and simplicity! What would be the implications of such a trend catching on for marketers?

Juliet Schor penned an interesting essay on consumerism that highlights some inverse relationship between consumerism and community. We know that we are not rational, deliberate and in control every time we buy, either.

One need only to think about brand preference to know that we make emotional connections to goods or betters. You buy Pepsi because it represents the future, Reebok shoes because the company stands for strong women. You develop a brand preference, and believe that your brand is superior in quality.

The Economist has an interesting article about the endowment effect, humankind's inner chimpanzee refusing to let go. When we own something, we associate more value with it. Hence the hesitation to letting it go. Schor states that consumption is social. The Economist adds:

Other “irrational” phenomena include:

• confirmation bias - searching for or interpreting information in a way that confirms one’s preconceptions;
• the bandwagon effect - doing things because others do them; and
• framing problems - when the conclusion reached depends on the way the data are presented.

I present this information because it should affect the way we think about marketing. As Schor puts it, there are fruitful and essential linkages between production, consumption, and the environment that we should be making.

I would go further. I think there are fundamental decisions we need to make about the noise and clutter we make with our marketing communications.

Here's why:

• Too many materials confuse your brand. What does your brand stand for? There is a reason why we call them materials - they occupy space. During my career, I've done two full audits of marketing inventories: brochures, sell sheets, technical bulletins, etc. All occupying space in warehouses, many going into different directions on content.

The temptation is to think that more is more. In many instances less is more - try a short and to the point eBook instead of a long white paper; use digital versions wherever possible, do not overproduce. Most importantly, do not inflict competing materials on employees and customers.

• Too many materials confuse your employees and customers. Resist the temptation to think that your value depends on the volumes of things you produce. Instead, look at value as the ability to extract the essential elements of your brand promise and deliver those with consistency - that includes consistency of experience.

Your customers and employees care about being in a conversation with each other where you are now a participant, not the center. How does that consideration change the way you can think about materials? Your brand is a commodity if all you're doing is talk about yourself anyway.

My challenge to me and to you: what are the 100 unnecessary things that we can eliminate from our current marketing communications? They either do not work - a case of more is not more - or are inefficient. What are the activities and dynamics we could introduce to replace the ones that are not working anymore? Remember to trade one or two for one wherever possible.

We can start small. Feel free to make suggestions here in the comments. I will call this the 100 Marketing Conversations series in future posts - we will be discussing social media, social networks, events, communities and collaborative alternatives to the practices that we discontinue.

© 2006-2009 Valeria Maltoni. All rights reserved.

Comments

[k]

Great, interesting post.

I once kept a beat up, worn out Samsonite suitcase for months even after I bought a fancy new one, because it had been to so many countries with me that I couldn't bear to throw it out.

Pack Rat tendencies + Sentimental heart = overflowing closet.

I still fight the urge to save every interesting brochure/magazine ad/direct mail piece I see.

I'm interested to see what suggestions others have for their 100 unnecessary things in marketing communications. It may help clear up some of my plans, as well as my desk.

Cheers.

[Amanda Gravel]

Love this post, Valeria. I sat here for a minute thinking if I could really live with only 100 things. To me, that seems impossible--I guess my inner chimpanzee is a powerful force.

But you're absolutely right. Clutter leads to confusion, and that confusion leads to the eventual need to clean up--our homes and our communication.

[Valeria Maltoni]

@Kim - I used to keep a creativity folder myself - and old copies of Communications Art, Print magazine, as well as Fast Company. Then I learned to let go and share the wealth with others by giving them to colleagues and friends. Every second Friday I clean up my office of the accumulated things I do not need. It's a good habit to have. Paper is like blood, you've got to keep it flowing ;-)

@Amanda - I noticed you moved into (or signed to move into) a new place recently, so this probably spoke to you more. It takes discipline to resist the temptation to keep everything - I might wear that one day... I might look into that file. It rarely happens as we are either looking at new styles, or have grown beyond that work. I'll be curious to hear from other marketers what they would start eliminating.

[Digital Nick]

Just as writers try to eliminate unnecessary words, marketers should strive for efficiencies in all communications.

"You've Got Mail!" is not only AOL's iconic phrase, but also a symbol of the millions of unnecessary AOL CD's that Americans received in the mail. Technology innovations have reduced this type of wasteful marketing; but not necessarily the clutter (Hint: You've Got Spam!).

Today, many PR practicioners and marketers have moved to electronic press or sales kits - releases, brochures, white papers, images, videos and other marketing materials all contained within a branded thumb drive.

Save a tree and go USB.

[Valeria Maltoni]

Somehow, physical junk mail offends me much more than electronic versions for that reason - wasting paper. But because of the space that spam occupies in our email boxes, making them too crowded, I think we will see a resurgence of marketing by mail.

The answer is to do more permission marketing, less shooting in the dark. A pleasure meeting you, virtually.

[Stephen Denny]

Valeria: I know how you feel. I once moved on a train (one suitcase, one duffel bag). That's all I owned at the time. Living in a 6 mat apartment in Tokyo was a good exercise in economy.

The Economist's "irrational phenomenon" are actually building blocks of social psychology. It isn't irrational - it's how we're wired.

Re cutting the 100 things in marketing communication, this is a good process -- call it "contraction and expansion": first, cull the herd of the unnecessary, then make more of the good stuff.

Good post!

[Mike Wagner]

"what are the 100 unnecessary things that we can eliminate from our current marketing communications?"

THAT is one sweet question!

Keep creating...brand altering questions,
Mike

[Valeria Maltoni]

@Stephen - plenty of case studies from the psychology chapters every day at work. My take is that a concentrated space where there is an artificial environment of scarcity (only so much praise, so many titles, etc.) brings out the primal impulses in people. It is good to own little, one travels light and has access to greater opportunity.

@Mike - I can count more than 100. One has to start somewhere. There's also a conversation around the importance of marketing communications we'll want to have at some point soon.